moral law being an expression of mind, supreme or otherwise, it was
merely the generalised experience of mankind which had discovered that
certain acts were attended by pleasurable or useful results, and
certain other acts by painful and mischievous consequences, which had
led men to describe the first class as good and the second as evil, one
might reply that herein we have stated a truth but not the whole truth.
To us the fact that good living and well-being are so intimately
associated, and that "the way of the transgressor is hard," is only one
more evidence of the main contention of our school. Surely, if man
awakes to the discovery that the laws, neither of nature, health, nor
of private or public life, can be violated with impunity, more than
ever is he convinced that the universe is, in Emerson's singularly
expressive phrase, "so magically woven" that man must come to ruin if
he sets himself to systematically disregard them. The word "woven" is
an illumination in itself, showing how the warp of constant nature and
life and the woof of man's conduct are meant to work and must work
harmoniously together. And if this be indeed so, if we adopt Bentham's
language and call "pleasure and pain our sovereign masters," what have
we but a further indication that things are so ordained, that the
universe is so constructed, so to speak, that you cannot get the good
out of it unless you conform to moral law--in other words, that in the
long run wrong, virtue and happiness are reconciled? Well, but the
ordering of things, the ordaining of a course of things, what is this
but the work of intelligence? And therefore Bentham, no less than
Kant, contributes his quota to the universal conclusion that the moral
law implies theism in the sense explained. Wherefore, it may be added,
there is no reason whatsoever why a rational ethic such as has been
sketched should not avail itself of the unquestionable services of
experience in determining what is and what is not in conformity with
morality. If a man sees the world as one, and all intelligence as one,
he will be assured beforehand that things are so constituted that
mischief cannot permanently or ultimately befall him if he lives what
he knows to be _the life_. And, therefore, the considerations of pain
and pleasure, utility and mischievousness, are extremely serviceable
criteria whereby we are assisted in that codification of morality, in
that determining of what is good and what is evil, only it must ever be
pointed out that they are not the ultimate explanation or basis of
morality, which is built, not on any hedonistic or utilitarian
foundation, but on the reason in us, in the universe, which commands us
to live as offspring of that reason, or as Paul puts it from his point
of view, as "children of the light".
And, in explaining why pleasure and pain cannot be regarded as "the
sovereign masters" of ethic, we may add to the evidence for our
conclusion. It appears that Bentham and his school do not observe the
proprieties of language in identifying the moral good, the moral right,
with pleasure. The ideas are really incommensurate, as is well pointed
out in Schurman's monograph on the Kantian and the evolutionary ethics
of Spencer. The ethical "ought," the word which gives the keynote to
the whole science, does not and cannot mean what is "pleasurable,"
"serviceable," or "useful". The word essentially implies the "ideal,"
the conformity to a definite standard of right, the approximation
towards a goal or standard of conduct implicitly recognised as absolute
good. But the ideas of "pleasurable," "useful," and the like concern
the moment only; they merely suggest that man should secure the
advantage offered or avoid the pain which may befall him here and now,
or some time subsequently to his contemplated action. Hence there is
no obligatory force in this ethic. Prudential motives, suggestions of
expediency, abundance of counsel, if you will; but we miss the note of
authority, the commanding voice, the categorical imperative, the solemn
injunction, "Thou canst, therefore thou must". Indeed, it seems
difficult to see how one could convince a man on hedonistic or
utilitarian grounds that a course of conduct on which he was bent, and
to which he was allured by the overmastering impulse of a vehement
nature, and which promised him sensible gratification, possibly even
material advancement, was not legitimate. I do not press this, nor do
I suggest that moral elevation of life is not discernible amongst
professors of this interpretation of ethics equally with those who take
an idealist view. All I say is, that the recognised terminology of the
ethical life, the "ought," the "must," receive an ampler recognition, a
fuller interpretation, in the rational schools than in those of Bentham
and Spencer.
And, finally, we may approach the question from the point of view of
evolution. Everybody knows the pitiless manner in which the late
Professor Huxley contrasted the ethical man with the cosmical process,
how he pointed out that the one hope of progress lay in man's ability
to successfully combat by ethical idealism the rude realism of the
material order of which he is a part. The facts need no exposition.
Every man has the evidence of it in himself, in the periodical
insurrection of the ape and tiger element in him against the authority
of some mysterious power which in the course of his long sojourn here
has been acquired, and to which he recognises that the allegiance of
his life is due. That tearful, regretful expression of the _Grand
Monarque_, after one of Massillon's searching, scathing sermons on the
sensual and spiritual in every man, "_Ah, voilà deux hommes que je
connais très bien!_" may be repeated with even greater truthfulness by
every one of us, now that Darwin has superseded St. Paul in the
explanation of the phenomenon.
Now, here we have a surprising contradiction in Nature, the startling
apparition of an element in man so utterly opposed to all that is
beneath him, that a scientific chieftain tells us that his only hope is
to kill out that ape and tiger, or at any rate keep it under unceasing
control. Whence is this extraordinary human element, and what
explanation can be given of the contradiction unless there be some
higher synthesis into which the antinomy is taken up and resolved into
unity? If out of the primordial nebula both the cosmos and man, with
all that he is, have been evolved, then it would appear, plain as the
writing on the wall, that some extraordinary transformation has come
over the scene as soon as man appeared, and that an element utterly
irreconcilable with all that has appeared previously manifests itself
in him, not as an accident or a fortuitous occurrence, but as an
essential, nay, as _the_ essential law of his being.
How can we explain this? How can we account for this complete _volta
face_ in Nature, which bids man turn his back on all that made the
universe and him, and resolve to live by a law so irreconcilable with
the methods of the cosmos, that I take it we should be justified in
saying that had it been in operation before man Nature itself could not
have been evolved?
We believe the contradiction receives its explanation in the synthesis
already suggested, that above the two processes, the cosmical and
ethical, there is another, that of absolute intelligence or mind,
energising through them both from first to last, but in widely
different ways. In the cosmos, by ways which we describe as non-moral;
in us by law, which we recognise as moral. In every grade of being, in
every stratum of Nature, the self-same ever-active Mind is manifest,
nay, the very distinctions of Nature's life are fixed by the intenser
or remisser energy wherewith the eternal Mind functions in them. From
first to last it is mind-power behind all and in all. "In the
beginning was Mind; in the beginning was the Reason." Lao-tze is
right; the Alexandrian mystic is right; _En archê ho Logos_, and the
Mind was the light of man, the light of reason, the holier light of
conscience, leading him if he will but follow it, in the way which has
been described in language of philosophic precision by the Hebrew poet
as "the way everlasting".
Man may sing a _Magnificat_, because mighty things have been done in
him, such as a cosmos or an infinity of worlds never knew or shall
know. And thus the very contradictions manifested by evolution do but
contribute to the truth of the general conclusion, that there is a
Power, not dead, dull, inert, but an ever-living, ever-energising Mind,
whence the mighty procession set forth, unto which it is ever
returning. There is a Power above the water floods and cosmic
disasters which is bringing to fulfilment purposes known from
everlasting, which we are compelled to acknowledge as beneficent. We
see its workings in history, in the rise and fall of nations; we
witness the morally, no less than the physically, unfit fall out of the
ranks. Progress here and there may seem to stop, but the course of
things is "never wholly retrograde". Is not that hope strong in every
man of us, going before us as an unquenchable light, encouraging us to
persevere even to the end, because we shall not be deprived of the
fruits of our toil, and no demon power shall come to dash the cup of
happiness which we have striven to fill?
And what is this but to confess that the Power manifested in the cosmos
is identical with the Power manifested in life, that physical and
psychical are ultimately one, that virtue and well-being are
indissolubly associated? What is this but to confess the supreme
synthesis, embracing all apparent contradictions, the ultimate harmony
in which all discords are ultimately merged and lost for ever? What is
it finally but to proclaim our faith one with that of the most eloquent
voice heard in this century, poet and philosopher in one, the sublime
Victor Hugo: "_La loi du monde matériel, c'est l'équilibre, la loi du
monde moral c'est la justice_"? Pindar's words again! "Justice is
rightful sovereign of the world." The Reason which is revealed as
equilibrium in the spheres, reveals itself as justice among men. Both
spring from one indefectible source. "_Dieu se retrouve à la fin de
tout._"
[1] Lao-tze, quoted in Huc's _China_, vol. ii., p. 177.
IV.
IMMANUEL KANT, THE ETHICAL PHILOSOPHER.
To think of what Immanuel Kant has been to the many men and women of this
century, who, having unlearnt the old traditions, had not yet found a new
inspiration--the souls that were athirst for the waters of life which the
ancient wells could no longer supply--is to be reminded of the pious and
generous tribute which the Jewish exiles, after their sad return from the
Babylonian captivity, paid to Nehemiah and his brethren, the reorganisers
of their race. "Let Nehemiah," they said, "be a long time remembered
amongst us, who built up our walls that were cast down, who raised also
the bars of the gates!" Precious indeed is the man who can recreate the
shattered fabric of the Commonwealth, re-enkindle the pure flame of
patriotism, and restore the inspiration of religion. A benefactor indeed
is the thinker who can give us a glimpse of the Divine on rational terms,
satisfy the exigencies of the intelligence without denying the cravings
of the heart, and provide an idealism for the inspiration and guidance of
life.
Perhaps it is not too much to say that the temporal destitution of the
repatriated Jews was a symbol of the religious and ethical decay of the
last century. Protestantism of the orthodox type, which essentially was
and is nothing more than the substitution of a book for a Pope, the
pruning of the tree dogmatical, the lopping off of some of its more
reprehensible excrescences, had visibly failed to meet the necessities of
"the irresistible maturing of the human mind," to quote an expression of
Emerson's. The older Church had prophesied accurately enough that
Lutheranism would turn out but a half-way house to infidelity, and sure
enough it did. Its thorough application of the principle of private
judgment in matters of religion could no more justify the inspiration of
Leviticus than the federal headship of Adam and the dogma of endless
vindictive punishment. Hence Lutheranism necessarily meant the gradual
disintegration of dogma, that is, of all super-rational truth, for every
man "outside the sacred circle of those bound over not to think".
When we remember, in addition to the decay of Protestantism, that Roman
Catholic countries afforded more than sufficient evidence of the
inability of their own religion to meet the increasing needs of the
age--how France, Spain, and Portugal were devastated by the sceptical
disease; how they insisted on and carried the total suppression of the
Jesuit Order, beyond compare the ablest body of men their Church had ever
produced; how the French Revolution was in its inception profoundly
anti-Christian, and in its progress even anti-religious--when, I say, we
call to mind these facts, we are able to appreciate the accuracy of the
statement that, through the maturing of the intelligence of man, the
ancient traditions had lost their hold, not only of Protestant, but of
Catholic, lands. Without leaving for a moment the eighteenth century, I
think we are warranted in stating that the close of the nineteenth
century does not witness a rehabilitation of those traditions. The truth
is more obvious than ever that in the men of to-day,
The power is lost to self-deceive
With shallow forms of make-believe.
Now, it would appear that Immanuel Kant was the man of destiny for the
work of the reorganisation of ethical and religious life. I look upon
him as the morning star of the New Reformation. He witnessed in his own
day the very low-water mark of scepticism, reaching even to the gross
atheism of Holbach in the _Système de la Nature_. He had the advantage
of everything which David Hume, "the Prince of Agnostics," as Mr. Huxley
styled him, found to say, and indeed Hume exercised a marked influence on
his German brother-savant, as we may, perhaps, later see. The whole work
of the _Encyclopaedia_ in France was done under his eyes; the galaxy of
brilliant writers who composed that school were contemporaries of
Immanuel Kant. He witnessed the crash which accompanied the downfall of
the old regime in France, the enthronement of anarchy in the place of
government, the complete eclipse of religion, and the worship of reason
symbolised on the altar of Nôtre Dame as my tongue refuses to describe.
It was the era of the deluge: the water-flood had burst upon Europe; and
there was nothing, no institution of State or Church, no philosophy, no
religion then extant that could stem the rush of the torrent. Never was
the effeteness of ancient systems, the impotence of the old idealism,
more conspicuous. In the midst of this wreckage the problem of
reconstruction had to be faced. Immanuel Kant did face it, and his
object was to provide against the recurrence of atheisms and anarchies,
to make godlessness and revolutions impossible, to ensure religion's
being a help instead of a gross and deplorable hindrance to progress, and
to provide man with an idealism and an enthusiasm which would satisfy his
utmost desire for knowledge, and yet stir the pulses of his moral being
by the suggestion of an irresistible emotion.
Such I conceive to have been the work which Immanuel Kant undertook in
the system of the transcendental philosophy.
The name of this thinker is so famous, I had almost said so venerable, in
the ethical Church, that I may be allowed to put before my readers, who
may be unacquainted with the details, a few personal or biographical
notices concerning him.
Immanuel Kant was born at Königsberg, in Prussia, on 22nd April, 1724, of
humble parentage. He was apparently destined for the Church, since his
first efforts were directed towards the study of theology in the
university of his native town. But natural science and philosophy proved
of far more powerful attraction, and, abandoning Divinity, he earned his
livelihood, first of all, by acting as a private tutor in the
neighbourhood of Königsberg, and afterwards by assuming a similar office
in his own university. He subsequently, at the age of forty-six, became
a professor of the Philosophical Faculty, a post he retained till his
death in 1804. The deep reverence and religious emotion which betrays
itself in Kant's ethical writings was probably due to the influence of
his parents. His father was venerable in his eyes as a man of moral
worth. Honesty, truth and domestic peace characterised his home. For
his mother the philosopher cherished the tenderest of recollections, and
to her religious feeling, detached as it was completely from formula and
system, he probably owes the fervour with which he speaks--as do Emerson
and Carlyle--of the sublimity of the moral laws, and of the infinite
dignity of a life lived in harmony with them. When he lost his father at
the age of twenty-two, he wrote in the family Bible: "On the 24th of
March my dearest father was called away by a blessed death. May God, who
has not vouchsafed him great pleasure in this life, grant him the joy
eternal!"
After a youth spent under the spell of such surroundings, we are not
surprised to learn that Kant was of a singularly grave, gentle and quiet
demeanour, which in old age tended to deepen into austerity and increased
conscientiousness, were that possible, in the fulfilment of his duties.
With the simple words, "It is the time," his servant Lampe called him
every morning at five minutes to five, and never to the end, according to
the testimony of his servant, was the summons disobeyed. In the
thirty-four years of his professorship he was reported to have been only
once absent from his chair, and that owing to indisposition.
Kant lived a solitary life; he never married. Like more than one eminent
man in the past and present, absolute want prevented his inviting the
woman he loved to share his lot. The world has just learnt that Tennyson
was engaged to his wife for twenty years, from her seventeenth to her
thirty-seventh year, owing again to stress of circumstances, and there is
living now one eminent man for whom, as for Immanuel Kant, comfort,
competence, and fame have come too late to allow of any share in the
blessing and joy of home. Such things cannot but deepen the hold these
elect spirits have and shall have upon men unto all time.
Of religion Kant conceived a noble idea, but he did not find it realised
in the Churches of his day. Sacerdotalism, even in its mildest forms,
was abhorrent to him. During his manhood he never entered a church door,
a fact which is a source of deep pain to many of his most enthusiastic
biographers. Once only did Kant take his place in the procession which
made its way to the cathedral on an especial day in the year, and was
joined by the rector and professors of the university, but on arriving at
the door he turned back and spent the hour of service in the retirement
of his rooms. To his free soul it was a performance, professional and
sectarian, and in consequence, something of a profanation. His disciple
Hegel must have been moved by similar feelings when he replied to the
questioning of his old housekeeper why he did not attend Divine service,
"Thinking is also a Divine service!"
Nature had an irresistible fascination for him. He learnt that also from
his revered mother, whose joy it was to take her child into the world of
Nature, where the Soul of the worlds is so conspicuously at work, and
instil into his young heart a deep and tender love for the beautiful life
around him. Thus he couples the impressive spectacle of the holy night,
revealed in the shining of the eternal stars, with the supreme object of
emotion, the moral law within the heart, as the most awful of realities.
But not only for Nature in her sublimer aspects did he conceive so
reverential a feeling, the humbler exhibitions of beauty and wisdom were
equally moving to his awakened spirit. Once he told his friends, whom he
constantly had with him at his dinner-table, he had held a swallow in his
hands and gazed into its eyes; "and as I gazed," he said, "it was as if I
had seen heaven". The great lesson of Mind in Nature he had learnt well
at his mother's knee, and he never forgot it. Children, so recently come
out from one eternity, their souls so well attuned to the wonderment and
mystery there lies hid in things, are peculiarly susceptible to such
beautiful influences. Nature is the temple in which their tender souls
should learn their first lessons in worship and see the earliest glimpses
of the Divine.
Kant lived into his eightieth year, surrounded by the homage of Europe,
which made him, in a sense, the keeper of its conscience. His ethical
treatises caused him to be consulted from the most distant lands on
questions of moral import. It is on record that many of his
correspondents paid insufficient postage upon their letters--a fact which
meant considerable loss for the philosopher. Indeed, so habitual was the
forgetfulness of these ethical sensitives that Kant at length refused to
take their letters in. After some thirty years of professorship in his
own university his marvellous powers began to fail; his memory served him
no longer; his great mind could think no more the thoughts sublime. The
keen senses grew dull, and the light of his "glad blue eyes" went out.
His bodily frame, which by assiduous care he had maintained as a worthy
organ of his mind, sank into weakness. His last years, his last hours
even, are described by his well-beloved disciple and friend Wasianski
with a faithful and pathetic minuteness which, in the view of some of the
great thinker's deepest admirers, might well have been less microscopic.
The spectacle of a great mind losing itself at length in the feebleness
of age, almost the imbecility of second childhood, might well, they
consider, have been withdrawn from the vulgar gaze. "Yet," as the late
Prof. Wallace most truly remarks, "for those who remember, amid the
decline of the flesh, the noble spirit which inhabited it, it is a sacred
privilege to watch the failing life and visit the sick chamber of
Immanuel Kant." [1]
On the 12th of February, 1804, in his eightieth year, he passed away, the
victim of no special ailment or disease, but exhausted by the life of
deep and strenuous thought upon the most profound and sacred problems
which can agitate the mind of man. Simple and unostentatious to a degree
during his life, the great master left instructions that he was to be
buried quietly in the early morning. But for once his wish was
disregarded, and amid the mourning of his Alma Mater, his townsfolk and
the neighbourhood around, he was laid to rest in the choir of the
University Church, which during life he would never enter. As with Kant
so with Darwin, all men instinctively feel--even the most narrow of
sectarians--that the lives of such men were--I will not say
religious--but religion, and so they lay them at last within the shadow
of their altars as the worthiest and best of the race. It shows us how
deeply seated is the ethical emotion in man; it shows us that the
religion of every man at his best moments is such as Immanuel Kant
described and realised in his calm and beautiful life--a religion based
on the sublime realities of the moral law.
And now, perhaps, we may say something of the thoughts of our
philosopher, though at present it cannot be more than of a fragmentary
character. If the ethical movement is to prove enduring, the name and
teaching of Immanuel Kant must be frequently before us, and numberless
opportunities afforded for an ampler account of his doctrine. For the
moment my purpose was rather to put before my readers some idea of the
man himself whose teaching is now exercising so deep an influence on the
religious tendencies of the hour.